1 posts from August 2002

Sunday, August 18, 2002

How hard? Sometimes, adjectives--and expletives--can't do the whole job. We need to quantify our disappointment, put cold numbers to the depths of our futility.

And to do that, we turn to our old friend, mathematics.

Yes, students, you may be dreading math class in the school year that's about to begin and be wondering why, aside from passing tests, you should bother to learn anything beyond what you need to balance a checkbook and figure a batting average.

Well, because someday you may find yourself in a conversation like the one I was in recently when it became inevitable that, once again, the Cubs and White Sox were out of contention.

The Cubs haven't won a World Series since 1908, we noted. The White Sox haven't won it since 1917. Neither team has even made the World Series since 1959. We wondered: What are the odds against this happening?

Assume, for the sake of discussion, that instead of deciding the championship on the field, Major League Baseball simply drew the name of the World Series winner at random. Up until 1960, when there were just 16 teams, we would have expected a World Series title in Chicago every eight years or so.

That rate would have fallen off after expansion began in 1961. But even since then, Chicago has been vastly, dramatically overdue, given that over long periods of time in any pro sport that strives for parity even lovable losers will win it all once in a while.

Background: To calculate the odds of two random events occurring in a row, multiply the odds of each occurrence. For instance, if you flip one coin, the odds are 1 in 2, or 1/2, that it will be heads. But if you flip two coins, the odds of both coming up heads are 1/2 times 1/2. This equals 1/4, or 4-1 against.

So in 1909 the odds that the Cubs would lose the pull-the-winner-out-of-a-hat World Series were 15 in 16. Pretty high. In 1910 the odds were the same. But multiply 15/16 times 15/16, as above, and you get 225/256, or 14.1/16. Smaller odds, yet still pretty high.

But as we keep on multiplying, year after year, the odds shrink. By 1925 the Cubs began defying them by continuing to lose. By now, adjusting for expansion and 1994, when there was no World Series because of a strike, this defiance has become sheer contempt. We figure the odds are now 157-1 against the Cubs not having won since 1908.

(And "we" here is not a columnist's affectation. My math is so rusty that to answer the questions that came up in that conversational pity party I sought the help of my physicist father, several friends with extensive math backgrounds, and experts at Northwestern University and the University of Chicago.)

The odds that any random National League team could fail to win the pennant and a spot in the World Series from 1946 to 2002, as the Cubs have done, are still worse: 295-1 against.

But the true measure of the misery of the Chicago baseball fan is in the astonishingly long odds against both teams failing for so many years in a row. All other things being equal, the odds that neither the Cubs nor the White Sox would have played in the Series since 1959, when the Sox last appeared, are roughly 1,400-1 against. The odds that neither team would have won it since 1917, when the Sox beat the New York Giants in six games, are slightly more than 10,000-1 against. With math to show the way, what once appeared to be simply tediously repetitive bad luck starts to look like a bona fide curse.

However, in fairness, the random-winner conceit that underlies these calculations has flaws. For example, what do you suppose the odds were that the Chicago Bulls would have won six NBA crowns in eight years in the 1990s if the champion had been picked from a hat each spring?

One in more than 17 million. You can't figure a Michael Jordan. The guy had no respect for gravity or probability.

About "Change of Subject."

"Change of Subject" by Chicago Tribune op-ed columnist Eric Zorn contains observations, reports, tips, referrals and tirades, though not necessarily in that order. Links will tend to expire, so seize the day. For an archive of Zorn's latest Tribune columns click here. An explanation of the title of this blog is here. If you have other questions, suggestions or comments, send e-mail to ericzorn at gmail.com.
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Contributing editor Jessica Reynolds is a 2012 graduate of Loyola University Chicago and is the coordinator of the Tribune's editorial board. She can be reached at jreynolds at tribune.com.